The Blueprint of a Great College Essay

Posted on September 21, 2017 by Craig Meister

Today we are sharing a fun little exercise aimed at helping give a little perspective to those in the throes of college application essay writing. Students should take this as an opportunity to assess if they have paced themselves and structured their essays correctly.

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Examine the three key segments of three different drafts of the same college essay. As you read through the excerpts of the Good, Bad, and Ugly drafts, ask yourself why the examples in question are Good, Bad, or Ugly. Some reasons are obvious, some are not. Try to fill in the “…” of each section to actually complete the Good, Bad, and Ugly essays.

The vast majority of good college essays follow the same format. You still have control over the topic of the essay, but why reinvent the wheel if the most successful essay format already exists? Before you ever write an essay, really think about the question. Don’t just start writing. Make sure you answer the question fully by the end of the essay and have done so in a grammatically correct, structurally sound, and entertaining manner. Once you start writing, your essay should include:

The Introductory Paragraph

You don’t want to answer the question here. It would be too soon. Rather, you want to launch into your story full force. Weak essays simply repeat the question. Strong essays take control of the question by answering it, but without being hemmed in by dry, repetitive language. By the end of this paragraph you want to have a powerful thesis.

Ex Question: Describe a meaningful experience in your life.

Good: August 12, 2005 started out like any other day for me as I prepared for my duties as a camp counselor for disadvantaged city youth…It was the last time I would enter that coffee shop as a child because in the next two minutes I would learned the hard lessons of an adult.

Bad: The most meaningful experience in my life to date was when I crashed through the window at…Clearly someone had to do something, and I decided it had to be me.

Ugly: I have had many meaningful experiences in my life….Crashing through the window made me realize my past mistakes.

The Body

This is where you go in-depth and tell the riveting, meaningful story. Always employ the rule of “Show, don’t tell,” so you won’t create an essay that is too bland. You want to include only important details and describe them well. The body is the one to three paragraph section of the essay where you serve the meat – but make sure it’s lean beef. This is also the fly-over territory where it’s easiest to miss errors. Proof-read!

Ex. Describe a meaningful experience in your life.

Good: As I looked up at the menu, I noticed a tall man enter the shop out of the corner of my eye…By time lunch had arrived I had already been questioned by police, been on the local news, and interviewed by the third largest newspaper in the country. Yet, despite all of the excitement, I could only think about how much I wanted to be with my campers.

Bad: I hit the man over the head with the six-pack of iced coffee that the punk-rocker had just moments before placed on the counter (she was now unconscious by the bookstand)…The second reporter was even more blunt, “How does it feel to know you stood up to the Skokie Slayer?” I didn’t know what to say.

Ugly: This clearly effected me greatly…When I laid down the night before I never thought this is how I would be spending the morning.

The Conclusion

Tie it up in a nice little bow and make sure you have shown some sort of progression from the start of the essay to the end. This is the place it’s best to draw your own conclusions that go beyond, yet still support the thesis you posited at the end of your introduction. Bad essays have their thesis at the end!

Ex. Describe a meaningful experience in your life.

Good: Notwithstanding my prior derision at my “ordinary” summer job, I had learned there were far more important things in life than the exotic nature of summer employment…Standing up for right over wrong, showing courage in the face of adversity, and always looking out for those who can’t defend themselves are nice ideas, but it’s rare that we are actually asked to put them into practice. On that August day, I was proud to know that I not only knew the right thing to do, but that I actually did it.

Bad: I longed to be back at my regular routine helping children learn to play baseball… When school started again in September, nobody had such an amazing story of summer exploits and I realized that it never would have happened if I had not done the right thing – not just on August 12, but in May by taking the job at the camp in the first place.

Ugly: If I had had the chance to go to Argentina to act as a summer analyst or the opportunity to go to Costa Rica to rebuild the hurricane ravaged countryside, I never would have had this happen to me…I am thankful that this happened to me and I now, more than ever, believe in fate.

About Craig Meister

Craig Meister, the CollegeMeister, is the publisher of Admissions.Blog. He’s previously held university admissions and high school college and career counseling positions in Baltimore, West Palm Beach, and Rio de Janeiro. Learn more here.